Various techniques have been proposed for controlling and optimizing performance of turbine-power generating facilities, particularly facilities incorporating Kaplan turbines. Such techniques generally accommodate the influence of various operating parameters on turbine performance and may seek to optimize power production or efficiency of a turbine unit by properly adjusting the parameters, such as wicket gate and/or blade positions, known to influence turbine performance. The influence of the adjusted parameters on performance is typically known from past performance data, model testing, or empirical results of tests actually performed on specific turbine units. Such techniques allow the operation of turbine units to be manipulated so as to optimize their performance either automatically or by operator intervention.
Improvements in turbine optimization techniques have included systems for considering the influence of a large array of parameters on the performance of individual turbine units and the overall power production facility. In one such system, a multi-dimensional, or "N-dimensional" cam is developed, based on site information and measurement, including dimensions for various operating parameters such as head water elevation, tail water elevation, flow rate, power output level, location of a turbine unit in an installation, (e.g., across a stream) and operating data on neighboring turbines in an installation. The parameters form an N-dimensional array or matrix including cells corresponding to the various combinations of ranges for each parameter. Each matrix location is then populated with information indicative of the relationship between gate and/or blade positions and the various operating parameters of the turbine. Over time, the N-dimensional matrix is thus populated with optimal gate and blade settings for each combination of parameter ranges. Moreover, various approaches can be used for identifying the optimal gate and blade settings for each matrix location. Such approaches include the use of penalty functions assigned a value to each parameter such that the optimal gate and blade positions will be determined to minimize an overall cost function.
As improved control systems have become available for power-generating turbines, adding additional sophistication and potential for enhanced control of individual turbine units and installations, increasing emphasis has been placed on the impact of power-generating installations on the environment, including on wildlife. Specifically, improvements to the physical structure of turbine units have been proposed to enhance the statistical probability for survival of fish that pass through the units during operation. However, adjustments of controlled parameters to further enhance the statistical probability for fish survival has lagged significantly behind such developments. This tendency has probably been influenced by a perception that regions of optimal efficiency for operation of turbines generally correspond to regions of optimal fish survivability. While this may sometimes be the case, it appears that a more informed approach to control of turbine units should account for the influence of controlled parameters on both the power production level and efficiency, maintenance and fish survival predictions considered as separate, although interacting, influences on the system. Heretofore known control systems, however, have not been equipped to consider such factors and to subsequently control turbine settings based upon their combination. Moreover, even if modifications in turbine operation could be made to enhance fish survivability, known control systems are not equipped to account for the impact (e.g., economical, environmental) of such modifications in such a way as to adequately inform facility management.
Other drawbacks of existing control systems result from their limited control scope, both in terms of geography and controlled parameters. In particular, most known control systems typically operate on a single turbine unit or bank of turbine units. Although systems have been proposed for managing multiple dams, such systems generally take into account only revenue generating parameters, and not environmental impact variables. Consequently, such control systems are not well suited for implementation of system-level water, fish and power management and planning schemes. Moreover, because heretofore known control systems have concentrated on operation of the turbine units and associated power generation equipment, they are not well suited for altering other operating parameters, such as those relating to spillway and fish bypass structures, in an integrated approach for implementation of water and fish management schemes.
There is a need, therefore for an improved system for controlling operation of a power-generating turbine unit, installation, and system, wherein fish survivability is considered as a separate factor impacting the desired settings of controlled parameters, such as wicket gate and blade positions, as well as operation of spillway and fish bypass structures. There is also a need for a system which can provide both planning and monitoring functions, as well as real-time control of a turbine unit or installation based upon both long-range knowledge of fish behavior and upon immediate or short-range knowledge of fish location and movement.